Worse Games to Play
by HeadinTheClouds13
Summary: District 7 may be a large place, but the woods are deep and dark and people cling together within them. They share secrets. They tell lies.  A companion piece to To The Victor the Spoils. Hunger Games AU
1. Chapter 1

Every year on his birthday Charlie's mother would steal him a book from the Mayor's library. "From your father," She'd say lifting a grimy glass in a mocking toast, "The bastard." When he was younger his mother and his older brother would all pile into his bed and read him that year's book. One year it was a field guide of plants, another year a story about a boy and girl from rival families who fell in love. "Complete nonsense," His mother had scoffed, "Written in gibberish." But Charlie had always liked it anyways.

His favourite book though was the one his mother nabbed on his twelfth birthday, the most beautiful thing Charlie had ever owned with gilded edges and over 400 pages long. His brother had shaken his head at her, "You better be careful, Ma, dear old dad might miss that one." But his mother had just shrugged her shoulders and stayed up half the night with Charlie reading.

They were old stories, myths the book called them, all about terrifying monsters and brave heroes, beautiful damsels and mighty gods. Charlie loved that book more than anything and as the years grew on it changed from a pristine white volume to a tattered dog eared thing no one would ever believe had come out of the Mayor's library. He had written in the margins, his favourite parts, little remarks to himself, and of course words he didn't understand, highlighted for future reference.

Words like Labyrinth.

_Labyrinth_.

The word echoes in his mind as he stands on his plate, looking, not at the gleaming Cornucopia filled with all the finest in lethal weapons but at what's sprawled out behind it. It's a giant maze, he can tell already, walls as tall as the justice building branching off from behind the circle of tributes. Some of them seem to be made of some sort of plant but others are made of brick, chain link fencing, even some sort of shiny metal. He gazes around the circle of tributes, Steven had warned him to stay away from the bloodbath. _Just grab something near the outside and get out of there. You've got sponsors so don't get yourself killed over that_. When had he said that? After the interviews? Last night? This morning before he had been dragged away by his stylist?

The gong goes before he figures it out. His feet kicking off hard on the ground, some sort of cobblestones, nicer than the ones in the Victor's Village. No one lives there but Charlie remembers sneaking around it in the night with some of his friends. All daring one another to go ring the doorbell. Story goes that the ghosts of dead Tributes lived in the empty houses.

He zigzags his way around the carnage, fast from years of playing tag in The Hob, bothering the Peacekeepers. Something metallic glints out of the corner of his eye and he dunks to avoid being sliced in half by the girl from...6? 5 maybe? He doesn't ponder it too carefully, grabbing a bundle of supplies as he crouches before running off into the maze. Charlie keeps running, like he's flying, like he's got Hermes' shoes and he feels invincible. He runs so long that morning turns to evening and the walls, which are made of some type of vine, turn into brick wall.

_You can't sleep first night_. Steven's voice in his head reminds him, _"The Careers will be on the hunt, second morning is usually good for a few hours, just not the first night."_ So instead he spends most of the night checking over his supplies (A canteen with water, a small hatchet, two protein bars, and a pack of matches all wrapped up in a rough piece of cloth) and trying to deduce what the Gamemakers were thinking. Steven had said that was important too. Staying alive was partially about skill and of course luck but it was also a lot to do with the story the Gamemakers were trying to tell. Charlie had to make sure he fit into that story. He watches the faces in the sky. Only 6, that's uncommon for the first day but surprisingly both of the tributes from 2 are gone.

He leans against the brick wall for hours, the night getting colder but not horribly so. Charlie catches himself, once, twice, thrice, falling asleep but despite the exhaustion wearing at him he can't regret staying up with Steven. Even if the traps they had worked so hard on seem like they'll be pretty useless here, no trees, no bushes, no rocks, just cobbled ground and the neverending maze. The walls are 20 feet tall at least and are completely sheer and smooth. No possibility of climbing the brick ones then, he could attempt to get up in the vine section but something about the plants had felt sinister. _Trust your gut, it's the only thing you've got. _Steven's voice reminds him, _Don't eat anything you don't recognize and for the love of Panem don't let yourself get seduced. _

That had been a popular strategy for the past handful of games. There had been that girl from 1 who killed off six male tributes and one female by kissing them, her lips covered in poison. And then of course Gloria from 6 two years ago who had seduced and killed five tributes in the midst of various sexual acts. That had been a popular Games. Even in Steven's year there had been a boy who had seduced and kill a handful of the female tributes. Before he had wandered into one of Steven's traps.

Charlie remembers that year so vividly. It had been right after his mother had died and he and his brother had moved in with their grandparents to avoid the children's home. It was only marginally better, his grandmother was old and delusional spouting out nonsense and his grandfather never spoke, just stared at nothing with the raw looking holes where his eyes used to be. So Charlie watched the Games. He had seen bits and pieces before, it was mandatory after all but usually he'd just sit in front of the television, one of his books in his lap, only looking up if a particularly gruesome scream disturbed him. Now his books were gone, sold to buy food and blankets, the small amount of compensation their grandfather received was hardly enough to support two people let alone four. So Charlie watched the Games in complete for the first time in his life.

He remembered Steven looking so small and pale on his chariot, dressed in some sort of skin tight body suit painted to look like the inside of a motherboard. Three years later Charlie would find out that it was in fact painted onto his skin, gold and green. He remembered Steven's interview, him looking much more relaxed as he chatted excitedly about being apprenticed to an inventor and all the projects he was working on. Caesar Flickerman had grinned at him, "Well sounds like you'll just have to win so you can finish those projects!" Steven had smiled back and Charlie remembers that smile, all lips and no teeth, and he remembers thinking someone like that would never last five minutes in the arena.

He was so wrong.

Pushing himself up from the wall Charlie stretched out his arms, his shoulders cracking satisfyingly. He attempts to look for food jogging along the maze but eventually admits defeat and eats half of one of his protein bars. It's the best thing he's ever eaten and he has to physically stop himself from scarfing the rest. Charlie jogs along for another hour or so, changing paths quickly when he hears the clang of something metal and heavy in the distance. Eventually he ends back near the vines and finds himself a secluded spot where he can attempt to get a few hours of sleep. He's awoken twice by a canon boom, 8 down, 16 to go. Finally he's asleep and dreaming, something about his mother, when he's jolted upright by a bloodcurdling scream, and it's close. He starts running towards the noise. _People get overconfident after a kill, they get lazy and it's easier to catch someone off guard. _So he follows the noise, because he trusts Steven.

So when he sprints into the vine section, his hatchet in hand he's expecting the end of a standoff, someone dead or dying, and the victor close by. Only there's only one person, the boy from 11 dragging himself around the ground, crying hysterically. There's so much blood that at Charlie doesn't even see it. His leg is gone. His stomach turns, this can't have been a knife, or even a sword. To make a cut like that someone has used some sort of saw.

"Who did this?" He asks, the boy from 11 hiccups and shakes his head, he got a 9 in training, he's big brawny and is going to die. "Look, you're dying. There is no medicine they can send you that will fix this. But I can help you, I promise, you just need to tell me who did this. That's all."

"Wasn't a person, was the maze." He sobs, "Kill me please, kill me. KILL ME!" He screams his voice cracking. Charlie looks at the vines, they twitch like they know he's watching, he needs to get out of here and quickly.

"Do you have a knife?" Charlie could do it with the hatchet but a knife'll be quicker and cleaner. He nods and presses the knife into Charlie's hand, they're both shaking. "Okay. Okay. Just, think of someone you love." Charlie says and he slits his throat like they taught him in the training centre, quick and swift. And then Charlie's running, quick and swift. He has to get out of the vines, vines which can rip limbs out of your socket and then leave you bleeding.

Days pass, Charlie runs all day, sleeps for a few hours at night, avoids the vines, eats some protein bar, rinse and repeat. On the fourth day...no wait the fifth Charlie finds himself stuck. No matter what path he takes it leads him to the open space where the Cornucopia rests, the Gamemakers want him to cross through and he has no choice but to oblige. He braces himself as he sprints across, and sure enough he's hit from the side and rolls along the ground before coming to rest with the girl from 4 sitting on his chest. "Hello there." She purrs tossing her dark hair over her shoulder and holding down his wrists with hands that shouldn't be nearly as strong as they are. "Oh don't bother struggling, we both know you're no match for me. But I have a proposition for you. An alliance. What do you say pretty boy? You want to team up, or do you want me to cut out your guts? Your choice."

Charlie grimaces, he really has no choice. If he says no he'll be dead for sure, because this isn't a Career who ended up in training because they needed to fill a spot, this is a Career who ended up being trained because she likes to kill things. So he teams up with her, if only to prolong his life a few hours because he's realizing how very fond of his life he is. Her name is Aqua, which Charlie thinks is stupid but he refrains from telling her that, and she wants Charlie to help her kill the boy tribute from 4 and the girl from 1 who teamed up and tried to kill her in her sleep.

"So how'd you escape that one?" Charlie asks, half curious and half wanting to know what he can avoid for when he tries to do the same.

"Wouldn't you like to know." Aqua snaps from behind him, she refused to let him get out of her line of sight. He's a little bit flattered that she thinks he's big enough competition. They're almost down to the last 8, thats when things'll get really interesting. The Gamemakers really start to play up the the story, Charlie knows they'll make him out to be the underdog, you can't really help it when you're from 12, but he thinks he can make that work to his advantage.

They wander through the maze for hours, despite Charlie's doubts that they are simply going in circles Aqua seems scarily confident they're heading in the right direction. Finally, about half an hour after nightfall they stumble upon them. District 1 is sitting in District 4's lap and seems to be doing something very interesting with her tongue. Charlie watches as 4 pulls out a knife and runs it along the curve of her spine, almost lovingly. Only before he can plunge it in 1 produces a short sword and slices his neck from behind. 4 goes limp and the canon booms shaking the fence, it's the same type of fence that encloses District 12 and likewise it doesn't seem to be electrified.

Beside him Aqua makes what can only be described as a growl as she slinks in behind 1 and traps her by the throat with her forearm. "What!" 1 screams, sounding both terrified and confused. "You're dead!" She threatens struggling against Aqua. Charlie crouches, unsure if he's supposed to jump in and help or just hang back. Suddenly trumpets blare and the procession of faces are broadcast into the sky. The boy from 1, the boy from 4, and...Charlie falters. Aqua's face is shining in the sky with all of it's sharp beauty.

_You're dead!_ It wasn't a threat. It was a statement. Aqua probably died in the morning, they had killed her in her sleep...this is...

1 screams, Charlie watches as Aqua. No, the mutt rips a chunk of flesh out of her throat with her hand, suddenly sporting large claws. He should run, but that sword, swinging a sword was more like swinging a pick-axe than a hatchet or a knife could ever be. He had the muscle memory and the strength, if he wants to live he knows he needs that sword. Charlie sprints past the girl from 1 and the mutt in a heap on the ground dashing towards the blade, shimmering bronze in the dim light. He's just closing his hand around the hilt when a voice curls around him and makes him falter. "Where do you think you're going pretty boy?"

The mutt grabs onto his arm and pulls him around so they're face to face. Her eyes glow unnaturally bright and Charlie hates himself for ever thinking this could be a real person. She runs a hand along his collarbone, almost tender before winding back and smacking him across the face. The blow rattles his skull and he can feel blood dripping down his face from where her claws cut him. "Not so pretty anymore. No wonder your daddy didn't want you. No wonder everyone left you. He doesn't love you, he'll never love you."

But Charlie isn't listening because he hears something else, a hum, the low hum of an electrified fence. _Use your momentum, make their strength work against them_. With everything he has he throws her against the fence, her claws snag on his arm and the flesh rips but it's worth it when she hits the fence and her body convulses painfully. Holding his hand to his face Charlie grabs the sword and all the supplies from 1 and 4 he can carry before running in the opposite direction, any direction. He only stops running when the blood loss begins to make him woozy. He sits against the wall and is so delirious that he almost misses the parachute. It's a small vial with some sort of medicine that, when applied to his gashes, makes them stop bleeding and scab over. He sighs in relief, partially because of the medicine, partially because the mutt was wrong, he does love him.

Though that just makes this whole thing worse doesn't it?

It had been the night before the Games, Charlie had been lying on the floor of Steven's room unable to sleep and had instead spent the time working on his trapping skills, which were pretty abysmal but at least it was something to do with his hands. For the first time Charlie had let himself think about winning, and for the first time he wanted to win because he might have had something to stay alive for. This stupidly brilliant boy who wanted so desperately to keep him alive. The one who had met him at the train station and let him destroy everything in his room and pretended not to hear him when he cried. The one who fiddled with his helmet before his chariot left and the one who was waiting for him backstage after his interview.

"I love you." He said in the launch room minutes before he entered the Game.

"Charlie, don't."

"I do." It hung there like a threat, a bet, a dare.

"Don't. Don't you dare tell me you love me and then make me watch you die!" Steven had shouted back voice echoing in the launch tunnel going from calm to angry in seconds. His face went red and his eyes gleamed from behind his glasses.

"I won't "I won't die, Steven I won't. I'll come back for you. I will. I promise. You're everything I have to live for."

"It's not that simple. Dying...sometimes it's better. I want you to live I want you Charlie, I do. But I can't..."

"I'll win I will."

"And then what? You go home with 23 ghosts walking behind you, the nightmares, the Victory Tour. And then, and then they make you come back and try and keep 2 people alive and no matter how hard you try you're going to loose at least one of them. Do you _want that_? Do you even understand what winning means?" Steven was shaking, maybe with fury, maybe with fear.

Charlie was struck silent, "Steven..." He reached out for him

"Oh god." Steven whispered, horror and fear and realization and love all wrapped into one.

And then there they were, two frightened children clinging together. Mouths pressed together like oxygen tanks, like life lines, like hope.

The medicine works wonders, and Charlie spends a day resting and reapplying the lotion. The next day he runs around the maze and practises with his sword. It's different from a pick-axe for sure but the muscles in his shoulders and arms are strong and steady from the mines and he feels more confident with it than he ever did with a knife. The next day he starts to get anxious. There haven't been any new deaths, no announcements, and the maze doesn't seem to be shifting to get them together. Whatever the hell is going on in the rest of the maze must be insanely captivating. So Charlie keeps his head down and hopes that whatever is keeping the Capitol so engrossed isn't more of those Mutts that look like people.

But really he knows that it can't be anything else. So he isn't exactly surprised when he finds the girl tribute from 3 with five bodies laying at her feet with only 3 different faces. She looks up at him, her eyes completely wild, her skin tinged with that strange transparency you see in kids from 'indoor' Districts like 3, 5, and 8. Charlie recognizes his district partner Arin bent and broken at her feet. The girl from 3 is wild and desperate, clearly having been tormented for days by the Gamemakers sending Mutts after her that looked like the people in her alliance.

Though most of Charlie's sympathy for her disappears the moment she begins running towards him. She's got some sort of horrible club with spikes and despite her thin limbs she wields it pretty well. He dodges to the left and her momentum sends her sprawling. She scrambles to her feet leaving her club and instead choosing to try and kill him bare handed jumping at him and knocking him down more with surprise than skill. She screams, a high pitched and primal noise as she tries to tear at any part of his body she can reach. She isn't a mutt, that much is obvious, but fear had turned her into something not quite human. She settles on pressing her hands over his mouth and nose, his vision was just beginning to darken at the edges when he managed to shake her off. Charlie jumps to a crouch and reaches for his sword but comes up with the club. Not having the time to be choosey he swings at her with all the energy he can muster catching her in the temple. The sound alone makes him retch and he's up on his feet and running before he could see the damage he had done.

The canon booms and the sound chases him through the maze. Panting and shaking he drops down against a wall. Stupidly he puts his sword down and ran a hand over his face. There was only 1 other tribute left. The girl from 10. Charlie half laughed, half sobbed to himself. Though the sound stuck in his throat. Suddenly he looks up and his brother was looming over him. "How's it going kiddo?" Kindle asked smirking at him.

Charlie hadn't met Steven for the first time he was reaped. He had met him for the first time during his brother's funeral, he had died of a chest infection that they didn't have enough money to buy medicine for. It was what generally constituted for a funeral in District 12 and besides the gravedigger Charlie was the only person there. Charlie had just turned around to head back when he found himself face to face with Steven Meeks, youngest ever winner of the Hunger Games. And of course he did something stupid and shouted, "You're Steven Meeks!" at him.

"Uh yeah." Steven said sounding vaguely embarrassed.

"You were really, uh, good in the Games. I mean with the traps and everything that was brilliant. I really wanted you to win." Charlie blurted out before he could help himself only seconds later realizing how horrible it sounded.

Steven raised his eyebrows at him, he looked a lot older in real life, or maybe he just had an old soul like his grandmother always said. "Shouldn't you have been routing for the tributes from here?"

"Well, uh, I mean, they didn't really have much chance did they," Charlie said halfheartedly and embarrassed, "Just, it's like if they did win all they'd do is come back and be rich or whatever. You have all your projects right? That's important."

Steven had stared at him, his mouth opening to say something when half a dozen people came running towards them. Including Steven's mentor, the capitol escort, and Charlie's father. "You had us worried to _death_" The escort triled, his high pitched voice whiny and irritating as he lead Steven off by the arm. He turned his head and Charlie caught a last flash of his red hair before he was gone. When he looked back his father was staring at him.

"He's dead." His father said. It wasn't a question. So Charlie didn't answer, and instead took off at a run back to the Seam where at least he knew who he was supposed to be.

Charlie gaped up at Kindle, who couldn't possibly be real leaning up against a wall in the arena. He jumped to his feet grabbing his sword. "Whoa, whoa, simmer down Chaz." Kindle says goodnaturedly.

"You're not real, you're _dead_, Kindle I watched you die."

Kindle rolls his eyes and gives him a look like he's being childish, "Did he tell you that? Seriously, Charlie don't be stupid. He's not one of us. He's from District 3, that's practically the Capitol. Do you think you can really trust him? I'm your brother. We're family."

He keeps a tight grip on his sword but doesn't advance towards Kindle. No, he's not Kindle, he's a mutt that some sick Gamemaker dreamt up in a lab to torment him. But how could a Gamemaker ever replicate his every mannerism so perfectly if he's been dead for 3 years? _Don't let them distract you. Whatever you do you have to stay focused. _

Kindle's dead. He was buried 6 feet under the same day he met Steven and he knows that. He doesn't just remember it he knows it. So he starts to move, planning his attack as his arm flexes ready to strike.

But he's faster. Charlie finds himself, pinned against the stone wall of the maze. "Come on little brother, let's not be hasty." Kindle is glaring at him with eyes that never gleamed that darkly his forearm pressed into Charlie's windpipe. He struggles against him but Kindle was always so much taller and bulkier. He's got a firm handle on the sword and swings it into the side of the mutt's head. Kindle yelps in pain and releases him.

Charlie tries to run but he grabs onto his leg, claws digging into vulnerable flesh. He tries in vain to shake him off his sword dangling useless in his hand. He wants to use it, just raise it and slash away until the thing is dead. But it has the face of his brother and he just can't. He can't watch him die again. It'd be so easy. To just let go and die. Why is he even fighting so hard? There's nothing left for him in 12.

But there's someone left for him in the Capitol.

He kicks out hitting him in the chest. It doesn't exactly send him sprawling but it forces him to let go, at least momentarily. He spins away throwing all his weight into the strike when the mutt throws himself at him, literally throwing himself on his sword. And for one horrible second Charlie is sure he's wrong, that he's just killed his brother. But the monster goes down, and in death it looks nothing like his brother.

And then he's angry. He's so angry he can feel himself shaking, and he holds onto that anger so when the girl from 10 turns the corner she really doesn't stand a chance despite being quick and deadly herself. Charlie strikes her down because he refuses to give the Capitol anything else. No finally epic battle, just a clean quick shot. The canon booms.

_Ladies and Gentlemen I present the Winner of the 34th Annual Hunger Games! From District 12 Charlie Dalton! _He can almost hear the groans in the Capitol, sure some will be excited, 12's first ever Victor, but most will be disappointed. Because a Games is only as good as it's final battle

When they pull him into the hovercraft to shove him full of medicines and erase all his scars he lashes out at them knocking down a nurse and a few orderlies before feeling the sharp jab of a needle and the world tilts sideways before going black.

His name was in the Reaping 22 times so it wasn't exactly a shock when his name got called alongside Arin's. She was a Seam kid, a proper Seam kid, not like Charlie who had always danced the line between Seam kid and Merchant kid. Poor but with obvious ties to the upper class. Once Kindle called them Serch kids and he thought that was appropriate as anything.

Just because it wasn't a surprise didn't stop him from shaking from nerves as he climbed the steps up onto the stage. Steven was standing alongside the other loaned mentor, a middle aged woman from 7 and he knew Steven remembered him. Scrawny kids standing in the rain, both of them running away from death.

When Charlie finally wakes up he finds himself strapped into his bed and none to inconspicuously. He can see the thick leather strap holding his chest down. He shouts and screams until an Avox runs in a pumps more sedative into his system. He's not sure why they need him out so often, he didn't suffer any severe injuries but the cycle repeats for what is surely several days.

Finally they let him see Steven. He sits on the edge of his bed and somehow convinces an Avox to undo the binds keeping Charlie's hands down. Steven takes his hand and looks it over carefully. With all the scrubs and polishes it doesn't look like the hand of someone who's ever worked in a mine much less the hands of a killer. That was one thing Steven had been very clear about, only killers could win the Hunger Games. He studies their hands together, his seem much too tan and Steven's seem less pale than they should. "You're delerious." He replies when Charlie tells him this, fiddling with his token.

"I think maybe it's the walls, the whiteness makes you look...well not tan, but just less pale..." He trails off as more sedative makes its way into his system. He drifts like this for a few days, waking up maybe having a brief conversation with Steven or his stylist before being pumped full of more sedative. Steven explained that they were repairing some of the scars he had acquired in the arena and pumping him full of nutritional supplements.

"It's the Capitol's way of disguising what they do to us. When we're in the Capitol we're beautiful, when we're in the arena we're far away, it helps keep the two separate in their minds. It's psychological manipulation of the highest degree." He whispered as Charlie was drifting off, delirious enough that everything Steven said sounded wonderful.

A few times he starts to drift on the top of the medical haze and he hears Steven saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." before sinking back under. He's never sure afterwards if he was dreaming or not.

Then finally, finally they deem him sufficiently alive looking for his post-Games interview. It's surprisingly not horrible, mostly because the boy on the screen looks absolutely nothing like him running through the maze, hacking and slashing with his sword. They even manage to make the mercy killing for the boy from 11 look heroic. Whoever did the editing is a genius because in the end it turns him into an underdog hero. Mostly he sits dumbstruck through the replay only making a comment when he's asked a question. He tries to play up the confident cocky angle the stylist had been pushing for since his sexy miner debut. Charlie thinks it all sounds flat and fake though. Finally, finally he's crowned and they let him back onto the train and he's finally alone with Steven properly and with full use of his arms.

It's just like in the launch centre, only in reverse, they're both shaking and crying and kissing and one of them whispers; "Oh god" but they never figure out who.

They stop in District 3 so Steven can get his things and Charlie spends the whole time flabbergasted by the sheer amount of _stuff_. The buildings are all built upwards not outwards like in 12 where space isn't so much of an issue. Even the Victor's Village is vertical and Steven's floor has a view of the entire district looking huge and smoggy. It's also ridiculously messy.

"What's this?" Charlie asks holding up one of the dozens of pieces of machinery laying everywhere from the kitchen table to the bathtub.

"Uh, it's a compression sensor for a force field which calculates the speed, weight and velocity of projectiles and then calculates a return path accordingly."

"Sorry, what?"

"It's a sensor for a force field which throws things back at you. Theoretically. It doesn't quite work yet." Steven calls over his shoulder from where he's been stuffing blueprints and files from his desk into a bag.

"You're so sexy when you talk all technical." Charlie says and even though it's not one of his best lines they still end up sprawled on Steven's kitchen table, pieces of half finished inventions knocked onto the ground.

There's a picture on the mantle of Steven with a woman who looks exactly like him and a man who has the same eyes. Charlie doesn't ask about it when Steven tucks it into his bag.

Finally, finally they're pulling into the station in District 12 and Charlie doesn't want to get off the train. The moment he does he knows it'll become real. That he killed 3 people (and 2 who looked like people) and that because he comes home Arin doesn't, it's in the rules. He re-destroys his room and refuses to leave for days. Finally they send his grandmother. She sits on the side of his bed and pets down his hair. "Chaz, where have you been?" She asks sounding genuinely confused, "There was a boy on the television who looked just like you."

She still needs him so he gets up and he goes home. His grandmother babbles on about how she missed him and how they'll have a nice supper and they'll do the same when Kindle comes back. Steven helps him gather up the few things that might have any value from his Grandparents house. He's crouching under his old bed to pull out some of his mother's things they've saved when he comes up with a battered book with gold leafed pages. There's a letter tucked between the pages and it can only be from one person. Charlie leaves the book behind. He's spent long enough living in fairy tales and trying to live up to what someone else thought was acceptable.

They move into the Victor's Village, Charlie, his grandmother, his grandfather, and Steven. His grandmother dies in her sleep a week before he goes on his Victory Tour and he's a little bit grateful for the excuse it gives him to leave dinner early while in the other districts, Steven whispering about it to Mayors. Being thought ungrateful better than having to see the families of the dead. By the time he gets back his grandfather is dead too. He just didn't want to live without her.

"I think that'd be me." Charlie whispers once, the dark making him feel reckless and brave, "I think I'd die if anything happened to you. Just no point to living anymore I suppose." Steven kisses him back in response, a silent 'me too, me too'.

It's hard. That first year. His tributes die early on, one in the Cornucopia, one hunted the first night. They didn't do anything wrong exactly, they just didn't have the odds in their favour as the saying goes.

It gets harder the next year when Steven has to leave, go back to District 3 and mentor his own tributes, because they only have 3 Victor's out there and Charlie can't keep him to himself forever. So Charlie's left alone trying to grapple with the reality of keeping children alive. He sent the boy that year medicine, it wasn't the right kind, not nearly strong enough but it was the best he could scrap together with his meager supply of sponsors. Most of which he knows only put money in because they think he's handsome in sort of a charming district way. Lucky for him the Capitol seems to like the tribute/mentor lovestory enough to stop him from getting sold off for an evening with the highest bidder, but not so much that they're interested in their everyday lives.

Then there are months, the long months between the Hunger Games when everything is good. Charlie decides his talent will be fixing the problems in the mines, better elevator shafts, more efficient equipment, new techniques. Steven helps with most of the technical stuff but Charlie deals with the miners. The people who helped him when he had nothing else to turn to. So he repays his debt as it were. It doesn't magically turn District 12 into a less harsh or poor place but maybe he prevents one person from dying, a family from starving, and it's enough.

Months turn into years, Steven gets taller than him which amuses him to no end. He finally finishes his force field and sends the designs back to District 3. "It could really help a lot of people, usually now they just use the force fields that are electrified, which is great for certain things but think of all the needless deaths this could help prevent." He's so excited that Charlie can't help but think of the boy in his pre-Game interview, so passionate and excited that Charlie couldn't help fall in love with him a little bit.

Usually about a month before the Reapings is the worst, both of them start having nightmares and Steven slowly but surely falls back into insomnia. They spend the extra hours coming up with pages and pages worth of notes to help them prep their tributes. They make lists of the likelihood of certain types of arenas and the strategies of past victors. The best way to capture the attention of the Capitol is to do something different, to be a new type of Tribute. Although the Gamemakers are coming up with new ways of catching the Capitol's attention to.

The Gamemaker who designed Charlie's arena and the following 3 was a particularly horrible bastard, liking to mess with the tributes and drive them to insanity. The 37th Games featured the addition of an injection of a chemical compound which prohibited sleep before the tributes were placed in the arena. This lead for the slow degradation of the Tributes sanity. Charlie had lost his early on but he watched as Steven's remaining tribute went insane before dying of dehydration 4 days in. Steven had sent him water, twice, but he never drank it, only screamed and screamed. By the time they pulled the Victor out (Tina Dire, District 9) she was incoherent and their was no post-Game interview that year. Rumour had it she only won because she was too simple to go crazy. Needless to say that Gamemaker was fired.

The new Gamemaker favours natural disasters and more traditional beastly mutts. The first year it was a forest with trees taller than buildings in District 3 and Charlie had his first tribute to make it into the top 8. Her name was Hestia, and she was quick and straight up brilliant. She ran straight into the Cornucopia and dove into the ground, lying still, faking her own death until the carnage died down. It was a gamble of course, but it paid off. As soon as the Career pack left to hunt the remaining tributes she killed the girl left on guard duty and took the supplies she needed. She survived and survived even after getting in a fight with a handful of Careers. It was the final 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3 she held on. Charlie was constantly wanted for interviews and commentary, "I'm going to bring her home Stevie. I am." He said one night eyes glued to the screen.

Gerard Pitts from District 10 won that year. Speed and smarts don't beat teeth and claws.

It isn't for 12 years that another Tribute from District 12 makes it into the final 8. And two at that.

Charlie watches transfixed as day after day passes and Haymitch and Maysilee refuse to die, trekking on and on in the beautiful and deadly arena. When they reach the edge though and Haymitch discovers the force field his heart stops. Because these aren't the usual force fields used in the Games, the inelegant ones which will kill you on contact, this is the one which will throw you back. This is Steven's work.

Beside him Steven, (34, still taller than him, still brilliant) begins to shake. With fury or grief it's impossible to tell. "It was supposed to help people." He whispers going white and clutching at the tablet which controls and monitors all sponsors contributions. The Capitol has made him into a Gamemaker without him even realizing, they've turned him into the one thing he swore he would never be. Cruel.

"Steven. Steven. Look at me." Charlie grabs onto his shoulders and presses their foreheads together. "Steven, sweetheart. Maysilee and Haymitch need us. Okay? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. I'm fine." He whispers sounding shaky but functional. It doesn't matter in the end though. Maysilee is killed and nothing he could have done could have saved her. But there's still Haymitch.

"Another cocky Victor from District 12." Steven mutters because he knows Charlie doesn't get along well with Haymitch, though it's most due to how simillar they are. Especially since Haymitch threw a chair out of the train window.

"I doubt it." Charlie says watching the girl from District 1 running after Haymitch, "Probably another Career." Only then the unthinkable happens. He uses the force field. The one no one was supposed to know about much less use as a weapon. The girl dies and District 12 gains it's second Victor.

Charlie Dalton looses the love of his life.

Because he wasn't Haymitch Abernathy's mentor. Steven was.

The official report says he was killed when a rebel sympathizer broke into his prep room while he was preparing for the post-Game interview and slaughtered him along with his prep team.

On the ride back to 12 it's Charlie this time who throws a chair through the window of the train.

He waits. He waits until after the Victory Tour, he didn't have to go but didn't want Haymitch to be alone. He waits until after he's told Haymitch everything he can about how to survive after the Games, how to train Tributes, how to cope. Because being in the Games it isn't like getting a cold where you eventually get over it, it's like loosing a limb and you just learn how to hide your limp. Everything he forgets to say he writes down, he writes and writes and writes. He leaves it all on the kitchen table with a pin. A pin his mother gave him. A pin he gave to Maysilee Donner. A pin the Capitol returned to him with her body. A pin with a note to give it to her family. A pin which would one day spark a rebellion.

But Charlie isn't thinking of Mockingjays, or the Games, or Rebellion when he places the gun to his head. He thinks of all his tributes, his grandfather, his grandmother, Kindle, even Haymitch. But mostly he thinks of Steven. Steven Meeks. Victor, mentor, lover, genius, Steven.

And then he doesn't think of anything.

There's an old story in District 12, that the ghosts of Tributes and Victors live in the empty houses in Victor's Village. Go on, ring a doorbell.

I dare you.

**A.N. Holy crap. Okay, so apparently this is what happens when I get caught up in the lead up to the Hunger Games and the subsequent post-viewing excitement. I think this is probably the longest one-off I've ever written. I hope you liked it. I tried to fit it into canon as seamlessly as possible but of course I added my own spin. If you find anything that directly contradicts canon however please let me know. Thanks for reading! (and please review!**)

**-C**


	2. Chapter 2

Neil Perry is a liar. But it really isn't his fault. His been raised on them after all.

"You'll be fine," His mother says pressing a hand to his cheek, "It'll almost be like a vacation."

"Make us proud son." His father says, his back turned away from him so Neil won't see him cry.

District 7 may be a large place, but the woods are deep and dark and people cling together within them. They share secrets. They tell lies.

And the people who bid Neil farewell in the room in the Justice Building are not his parents.

His parents are next door bidding goodbye to the child they are allowed to acknowledge. Everyone knows, and Neil is the star of their charade.

It all happened, Neil supposes because of the crippling labour shortages in 7, that and the Hunger Games. New mandates were introduced claiming that all couples must have at least one child and couples with more children would be rewarded with extra rations. Any who did not comply to this rule would be severely punished. Suddenly couples who, for one reason or the next, could not have children were suddenly desperate. That's where Neil came in.

He knows it's not his parents fault, either set of them, they were all just trying to survive in anyway they could. He watches them out of the train window, all four of them as they wave and cry in equal measure. They won't reach out to each other, just go home, shut the blinds and prepare for the almost certain death of their children.

The Capitol escort is...chirpy. Flighty and awkward looking like a baby bird pushed out of the next too soon she coos and chatters to them while they wait for their mentors to arrive. District 7 is lucky in a way. No one would ever call it a Career district, that's for sure, but it's looser regulations with children workers and the nature of the work they do has lead to an above average number of Victors. This means Neil and Alani ("Just Lani", she whispered after her name was called) will each get their own mentor.

"You too are very very lucky. I mean think of how many districts have only one of two Victors to go around? A few years ago I was stationed in District 12, not nearly as charming as 7 I can tell you. So dirty! But yes, District 12 for _years_ they didn't have a mentor of their own, constantly having to bring them in. Now they have that boy, Charlie, and he's as brave and handsome as you'd please but so _young_. No experience at all, not like _your_ mentors. And look at that! Here they are!" Flara jumped out of her seat and made a grand gesture for said mentors to sit. "We were just talking about you!"

Neil restrained himself from rolling his eyes. Clearly Flara had a very loose definition of what 'we' meant. Kit, in his early twenties with dark skin and piercing eyes, and Elma a middle aged lady with a slim face and long greying hair. If Neil hadn't known that they were Victor's he never would have guessed that they would have been capable of killing anyone. But they watch the Games in school so Neil knew that Elma could break your leg without trying and that Kit had the highest body count of any Victor from a non-Career District.

"So." Kit says tenting his fingers and gazing at them, "Which one of you is coming home?"

"Kit, stop it." Elma says, "What Kit is trying to say is that obviously in the best case scenario only one of you can win. So with that in mind we can either train you individually or together. Obviously each one has it's draw backs, if we train you together you get advice and help from both of us. If you train seperately you can keep your strategy hidden from one another and will thus have advantages once you get into the games. Comments? Questions? Yes? No? No. Okay. Answer." She rushes through this speech briskly and Neil has the overwhelming feeling they've given this exact same talk to every tributes they've ever mentored. Lani shifts uncomfortably in her seat and Neil's skin crawls slightly, like he can feel all the dead tributes who've sat here.

"We want to be trained together." Lani says finally, her voice strong and confident. Then she falters and looks over at him, "Right Neil?"

"Yes. Absolutely." He confirms nodding rather more forcefully than necessary. Elma and Kit exchange a glance but it's hard to tell what it means.

"Alright then." Kit says, then to Elma, "Let's go with how close-knit and quaint we all are in 7. The sponsors will like that."

"Oh _absolutely_" Flara trills, "I mean look at them! They could be brother and sister!"

If there's one thing, one single thing Neil has learned from his childhood in 7 it's that children should never be underestimated.

"Do you remember?" Lani asked, whispered over the dining table while the adult were discussing something off to the side. Neil nods.

For years he had thought it was simply some dream he had as a child. One where his name wasn't Neil and he lived in a house that wasn't his and had parents with different faces than the ones he knew. It wasn't until years later when, while waiting for his mother to come pick him up from school, he caught sight of the dark haired little girl from his dreams. Neil was four. Lani was two. They both remember everything that happened that day.

"Should we tell them?" Lani asks, it's days later as they're standing on their chariots waiting to be paraded through the City Circle. Their costumes, Neil is fairly certain, are supposed to have something to do with pinecones, though he thinks they look more like brown lizard scales.

It's not until they're outside, in the roar of the crowd that Neil replies, "No. Don't tell anyone." And despite the horrible lizardcone costumes Neil seems to catch the eye of a few with his blinding smile and trustworthy face. Though when he watches it on the replay he thinks his smile looks so forced it's almost painful. People in the Capitol don't seem to notice things like this, they've never been trained to lie only to be lied to.

It only seems to get better at the interview, his persona as the loving and charming protector of Lani further solidified. "You must be very tightknit in District 7," Caesar asks, "I've never seen a pair of tributes as completely intertwined as you and your charming partner."

"Oh yes," Neil says, cheating out to the camera and smiling like Kit taught him. "We're all one big family." That one only counts as half a lie.

Two nights before the Games Neil turns 19. Kit somehow convinces Flara to let him take Neil to the bar in the training centre. Tributes are banned but somehow he smiles prettily enough and she relents. But she does write him a note and make him carry it with him in case anyone asks which makes him feel like a little kid with his address pined to his coat in case he gets lost. It also doesn't do anything to make him standout less, understandably most of the Victor's know one another. There are only 35 after all.

"What do you want?" Kit asks, Neil balks slighty, he's never really drank before except for one time hiding behind a storage shed with some of the laborours kids. It had been something brown that had burned his throat all the way down. He had liked it. It tasted like freedom.

"Uh, something strong I guess?" He sits on a stool to avoid hovering awkwardly. Kit claps him on the shoulder goodnaturely and orders two of something Neil's never heard of. He also orders lots of water and a basket of some sort of twisted bread.

"Don't want to be hung over on the last day of training. That's not a good strategy for anyone." Kit says shoving it all towards him. Neil remembers once when he was little he heard a rumour that in the outlying districts people used to volunteer for the Games so they'd have good food to eat before they died. Neil hadn't believed it, even during the middle of the winter when his mother added wood chips to the oatmeal and his stomach growled incessively, that anyone could ever be that hungry. But now, as he eats the bread twists, made savoury with herbs and garlic, he knows that if he had known the food would be this good maybe he'd have done the same.

"Who's the kid?" Someone asks comimg up behind Neil and surprising him so he ends up choking on his bread, the alcohol and water left untouched to the side.

Kit claps him on the back until his stops coughing, his eyes watering and streaming down his face. "Sorry." The newcomer says. It's Charlie Dalton. He remembers him from the Games of course, but his father had been invited to the banquet at the mayor's house on his Victory Tour. Neil remembers catching a glance of him as he went into house looking sullen and scared. Not at all the heroic Victor with a sword Neil had remember watching on tv and then secretly emulating in the woods, a broken fence post serving as a sword.

He doesn't look like a heroic Victor now either. He just looks tired and grabs the seat next to him. "Neil, this is Charlie Dalton. Charlie this is Neil, it's his birthday."

"Oh, well happy birthday then. Hoping to join our noble ranks?" Charlie asks gesturing at the barkeep for something.

Neil snorts, "No, not really." Kit rolls his eyes, it's obvious to everyone that Neil's going to do anything he can to keep Lani alive but he knows Kit is just dying to talk it out of him.

"Good plan." Charlie says knocking back half of the alarmingly blue drink he's ordered. Which pisses Neil off more than it should seeing he knew he wasn't coming out of the arena the moment they called his name after Lani's.

"You're shorter in person." Neil says just to be a little bit vindictive. `

There's a long pause as Charlie surveys' him and Neil starts to worry. He's just insulted someone who's killed people, who's killed _mutts _and maybe snarking at him wasn't the best idea.

"I like him." He finally says, more at Kit than Neil. "He's got fight in him."

Years later Neil was surprised Charlie had never said I told you so.

"Well I'm going to head to bed. Charlie can you bring Neil back up to our floor?" Kit says about an hour later rather abruptly in the middle of a conversation about swords versus axes as an arena weapon. Neil wants to protest that he's not a child and doesn't need to be shown back to the floor, especially seeing as all he has to do is get in the elevator and press 7.

"Yeah, yeah can do." Charlie says mouth full of bread (they've worked their way through 3 baskets). He swallows sharply, Neil can tell by the way he eats that before he was a Victor, Charlie never had enough food to eat and he hasn't quite caught up with that reality yet. "So, your district partner. You're in love with her right?"

"Not exactly."

"You're in love with her and she doesn't feel the same way?"

"She's my sister." It hang there in the air, so dense and huge Neil could practically reach out and touch it. There's someone else at the end of he bar but he doesn't exactly seem to be listening. Besides, he's already told one person, if Charlie wants to tell his tributes to exploit this he doesn't see the difference that another two tributes will make.

"You have different last names."

"I'm adopted, we're not supposed to know."

"What were you both in the children's home and adopted by different families?" Charlie asks.

Neil looks away, things are different in other Districts, he's always known this but the idea that there are unwanted children in other districts is pratically laughable. "No, um, my parents- that is my adoptive parents - they couldn't have kids and it's a law in 7, you have to have at least one child. So they bought me."

"They _bought _you?"

"My parents- my biological parents - they were poor and they already had 5 kids. I was the youngest after Lani and my parents wanted a boy." Charlie was starring at him dumbstruck, "What?"

"Just, I though my childhood was messed up. Does that happen a lot? Kids being...sold?"

Neil shrugs, "Occasionally I guess. But, we don't talk about it. I mean Lani and me have barely talked about it and I've never said anything to her brothers. They have to know though, I was 4 so they were...9 and 11."

Charlie shoves his drink at him, "You need this. Seriously, drink it."

For something so colourful it's surprisingly strong and it burns all the way down and into his stomach. "God, I can't believe I told you all that." Neil says looking down at his hands. It's not just because for all he knows Charlie could exploit all of this to bring his own tributes home, it's because he's never sat down with someone and put it all into words.

"Maybe we knew each other in a former life." Charlie puts forth leaning up on his elbows. "Anyways, I should probably head to bed. You too, training scores in the morning. Best not to be hungover for that."

The polished elevator doors ding open and someone walks out as they're trying to walk in. Neil recognizes him right away, it's Steven Meeks youngest Victor ever. "Hey. I was just coming down to get you." He says to Charlie eyes softening around the edges.

"Yeah, sorry I got caught up with Kit, and uh, well this is Neil Perry he's one of Kit and Elma's tributes."

"Hello." Steven says sticking his hand out, "I'm Steven Meeks." Which is a bit redundant because everyone in Panem knows who he is.

"It's my birthday." Neil says stupidly, feeling the need to justify himself even though he's almost certain they're the same age.

"Oh. Happy Birthday." He says awkwardly, because it's hard to congratulate someone on being older two days before they're being sent into an arena to die. It's really not much of a consolation to be slightly older than everyone else.

He ponders this in the elevator ride back to the 7th floor. He also ponders Charlie and Steven in their reflection on the front of the elevator door. They're holding hands, Steven's thumb running over Charlie's knuckles affectionately. At one point he props his chin on Steven's shoulder whispering something Neil can't hear but that makes Steven grin stupidly. It's not a thing you see in 7, sure you hear about girls who like girls and boys who like boys but it's generally something you're expected to grow out of. You grow up and you get married and you have children to keep the population stable. It's selfish to do anything else.

Only sometimes Neil thinks he'd like to be selfish like that. Sometimes.

Finally the door dings open at the 7th floor. All the lights are off and Neil realizes how late it must be. "Well, uh thanks."

"Sure, " Charlie says, "Anytime," like there's going to be a next time. He turns to head to his room. "Neil! Don't let anyone tell you what you're doing is wrong. Okay?"

"Yeah, sure. Okay." He stares at the elevator door long after it clangs shut and continues it's ascent up to 12. Sighing deeply Neil turns and fumbles towards his room. Lani is alseep on his bed, her dark hair covering her face, she was probably waiting up to tell him something. He considers waking her up but decides against it, falling into bed beside her fully clothed. His mind, which was spinning only moments ago in the elevator suddenly seems to go blank and he's asleep.

Lani gets a 6. He gets a 5. Neil pretends it doesn't bother him.

"Don't worry about it." Kit says, "Those are pretty decent scores for a couple of non-Career kids and since you're going to be a team we might be able to rustle up more sponsors than you would alone."

That last day Elma forces Lani and him to the table every two hours to down as much protein and carbohydrates as they can without getting sick. "You will undoubtably loose weight. Don't give me that face Lani this is your life at stake so shut up and eat your chicken." Long gone is the warm charming Elma replaced with the Victor who broke a boy's femour by stomping on it. Neil's jaw aches from all the chewing and his stomach turns each time she ushers them back to the table.

"You'll thank me when you're not dead. It's not called the Hunger Games by accident." She says self-righteously while rebraiding and pinning Lani's hair. She makes four braids and then wraps two around each other on each side of her head. It reminds Neil of the pretzel bread his mother used to buy him after the final exams each year. Birthday's were never very important to his parents, but final exams always were. A chance to say how proud they were of their son. Neil's stomach turns, and it's not just from the food.

Later Lani corners him in the bathroom while he brushes his teeth. "Don't think I don't know what you're trying to do. I know Kit and Elma are pretending they don't know but it's obvious you've all talked about it."

"Wha?" Neil asks toothbrush sticking out of his mouth.

"You're going to sacrifice yourself. Even if we made it into the top 2, not that we will, but you'd kill yourself so I could win." Lani says, there's no question in it. In the mirror, there faces side by side Neil can see how simillar they look. She's not that young, 16 going on 17, but she looks like she's 14 years old. "Neil. Your dad is the foreman, you're important."

"_You're_ important!" He shouts, "Don't let anyone tell you you're not important! No not let them convince you that you _deserve_ this somehow. Do not." He gathers her up in his arms. Her head fits perfectly under his chin. "Just let me be selfish. Let me do this for you."

"Okay," Lani says, "Okay."

Neil hates his stylist. He doesn't even remember her name but he can't help but feel a deep sense of loathing as she roughly dresses him in the clothing he'll be wearing in the arena. Like he's a store window dummy, his arms bent at angles they should never be and he worries he may end up being injuried before he even gets into the arena. She pulls his coat on, it's white and warm so snow for sure, and zips it up sharply the teeth of the zipper nipping him on the neck. He wonders how many dead tributes this woman has dressed. Whether that's made her hardened or if she's always treated them like corpses.

She leads him to the tube and adjusts his gloves one final time before stepping back. Neil wishes Kit or Elma could be here, one last word of advice before he's sent to the slaughter. But he's being pushed up, up, up before he can consider what more they could have told him at this point.

It's bright. Blindingly dazzingly white. The circle of tributes and the Cornucopia are set in a valley with mountains on all sides, unimaginatively high. There are trees on the slopes, that'll be good. Lani's a climber, if she hadn't been reaped she would have been a scout for sure. Cutting off sections at the highest points and predicting which way trees will fall. He glances around the circle of tributes. He recognizes a few from training. The pretty girl from 10, the prettier boy from 5, the pack of Careers, and Lani of course.

She stares back at him, "Ready?" She mouthes. Neil nods and turns away to figure out which way they should run, Lani is faster, she'll come to him and then they should head-

Suddenly there's a loud bang and Neil almost starts off his plate before realizing that it wasn't the sound of the gong. It was the sound of something much deadlier. The girl beside Lani is gone. Just gone. A large dark wet smear is left on the plate and Lani's entire left side is coated with blood. She screams and the sound intermixes with the gong.

Neil pushes off his plate and into the snow, but it's less like the snow in 7, which is hard packed into trails and more like jumping into knee deep mud. He half runs half wades to where Lani is still suck, immobile on her plate. Blood drips off her jaw and onto her coat and there are chunks of flesh stuck in her hair. "Lani! Lani! Come on we have to move!" He janks on her arm and she topples off her plate and into the snow. The cold and the fall seem to jolt her out of shock and she's up and wading through snow faster than Neil can keep up with.

They plow through the snow going up and up and up for what feels like hours. Neil glances back at the Cornucopia once or twice. The ground is spotted with bright stains of blood, behind them Lani's own trail fades from red to pink. She grabs a handful of snow and rubs it over her hair, throwing the stained ball to the ground. "Don't want to attract predators." She says and then grabs another handful and holds it out to him. Neil pauses, years of his mother telling him not to eat snow drilled into his mind. "Neil? Water is water. Eat it." So he does, biting into it and relishing the feeling of icy liquid on the back of his dry throat. Lani smiles at him approvingly shoving a handful into her own mouth and Neil has the uncomfortable sensation that he may not be looking out for her as much as she is looking out for him.

Though later when reminscing about this moment he would only concentrate on the fact that his mother had been right.

They keep climbing, up the mountain for a long time and then up into a tree. Neil first because Lani has to instruct him, he's strong but the muscle memory is missing and once or twice he almost looses his footing 60 feet in the air. They settle into a branch that's as thick as Neil is tall, the trees in the arena are unnaturally huge and he doesn't quite feel safe in it but it's the best they've got. Lani presses herself tight against Neil's side, half for warmth and half for comfort as the anthem plays followed by the day's dead tributes. 11. Almost half of them dead in 24 hours. Neil shudders slightly his stomach rolling when he remembers soon he'll be one of them.

Lani snuggles closer into his side and Neil has a sudden rush of rememberance, a long forgotten token of his rewritten childhood. He kisses the top of her head and rests his chin against it knowing that it's worth it if he can keep Lani alive even for a few more days, a few more hours, because when you love someone even a little time is better than none. Neil attempts to sleep but even with Lani pressed up against him he's freezing and can't manage to drift off, too much adrenaline coursing through his blood stream. So he sits and waits.

Until he's not. Suddenly it's day and he's running down the mountain, the dark whip of Lani's hair bounding ahead of him. "Neil! Come on, we're going to miss it!" She shouts darting around trees kicking up wet snow with every step. Neil turns dazzed, frantic and unsure of how he got here but Lani's out of sight and he forces himself to chase after her despite the nausea and fog lingering in his mind.

Lani is crouched in front of dead boy, Neil can't remember what District he was from. Maybe 12. "Quick, quick." She says grabbing the pack that's half dangling from his one arm an arm jutting out from his back. Neil catches a glint of silver, looking up he catches a glance of the parachute, the most beautiful axe he's ever seen attached to it floating down softly to land beside the dead boy. He holds it up reverently, back home it would be commonplace but in the arena it's a godsend, the handle smooth and polished the blade new and paperthin at the edge. Deadly. Neil swings it experimentally a few times. Perfect. "Come on," Lani holds out her hand, "Let's get out of here." She shoulders the backpack and they leave the body for the Hovercraft. It scares him how little he feels about the reality of his current situation.

They climb back up into a tree but it isn't the same one from before. Neil waits until Lani's settled in digging through the backpack and pulling out supplies, some rope, a flare, two cans of some sort of meat subsitute. She pulls a handful of snow off the side of the tree and sucks on it thoughtfully while surveing their new found supplies. "You've forgotten haven't you?" She asks without looking up.

"Yeah."

"It's getting worse." She says sounding much older than 17 even if she still doesn't look her age. "It started on the first night, I couldn't remember how we had gotten into the tree, then the next day-"

"The next day!" Neil says much louder than he really should. "How many days has it been?"

She shrugs, "Maybe 3? There are 8 of us left...maybe 7. There's a big pack of Careers 5 I think, then there's one or two other tributes left. And then us of course." She pauses, finally she looks up at him. "You told me all this you know, before you forgot again and you'll need to tell me when I forget."

"Okay. Okay I promise." He grabs one of the cans of pseudo-meat and pops the top. They eat in mostly silence the sounds of the Hovercraft filling in the place where their thoughts used to be.

The next few days are garbled and confusing. They both forget more and more, sometimes only a few minutes, sometimes for hours. One particularily horrible instance Neil had been walking through the forest looking for any edible plants when suddenly the feeling of distortion filled his mind and he was running. The pain in his chest and the pumping in his legs tell him he's been running for a while but when he looks over his shoulder he sees nothing. He slows to a jog but doesn't ease up his grip on the axe, when he pulls it to shoulder height, waiting for any attacks he realizes it has blood on the blade. Suddenly a bear comes crashing through the underbrush, it's only a cub but the dangerous look in it's eye tell him all he needs to know. It's a mutt. So he runs and runs and runs half wanting to climb a tree and half afraid to climb one and loose Lani. For one terrifying moment Neil considers it's possible she's already dead.

Ironically when he was a child Neil told himself to pretend he was running from a bear and if he slowed down he'd get caught. Now that it's actually happening though Neil finds bursts of speed he never in a million years would have known he could possess. He could kill it, if he was standing still he could kill it, but now. Suddenly there's a dark flash in his peripheral vision and he dives to avoid it. It's the girl from 2, her dark red hair dancing as she attacks the mutt cub with so much glee, so much complete and utter joy that it terrifies him. Suddenly Lani's at his shoulder, her one pretzel braid gone completely and her neck tender looking. "What the hell is going on?"

"There was a fire. We're with the tributes from 2 now."

"What? How long?" Neil asks half watching as the girl from to tears apart the mutt, it's like someone from 7 who's lost a limb to a logging accident. You want to look anywhere but their stump and find you can't. Lani clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

"I remember just before the fire. That was about 2 days ago, I forgot again and we were teamed up with Jotham and Leonie you had to fill me in. They don't have it. They aren't forgetting."

"Which means it's probably environmental, they wouldn't have just injected it into some of us. I mean they could have...but I don't think so. They gave that drug to everyone last year." Last year had been particularily horrible with the tributes going insane from sleep depraivation. They had announced that the isomnia had been induced by a drug introduced to the tributes along with their tracking chips.

Neil glances back at Leonie. "Sad isn't it?" Lani asks the dark ends of her burnt hair blowing in the wind. Neil raises an eybrow. "What? No one is born like that. They're not just trained with weapons, they're trained in other ways too."

Leonie bounds up to them, the bottom half of her coat stained with blood like she's taken a bath in it. "Ready to go Bambi?" She asks letting them follow her the spear dangling almost delicately from her fingers.

'Bambi?' Neil mouthes.

"Something to do with deer. Don't ask." They walk, down, down, down, towards the Cornucopia. Neil hates it feel too exposed but Leonie is unrelenting in her pace and the bloodstains remind him maybe she isn't to be messed with. "There's only us and Lux from 1 left. The tributes from 4 died in the fire, and I don't know what happened to the other guy. Jotham probably."

At the foot of the Cornucopia Neil can see Jotham, standing sentry weaponless yet incredibly deadly. You wouldn't guess from looking at him, he's lanky like Neil but not tall with bright yellow hair that stands up at odd angles like he's constantly pulling a hat off. Kit had laughed when the recap showed him volunteering in 2, land of giant killing machines. Neil and Lani hadn't been laughing though when during training he had paralysed one of the fight trainers.

"I lied" Lani says lowering her voice, "Some of them are born that way. Jotham's a freaking sociopath." Which is clearly evidenced by the bloody dead thing laying at his feet. It's a deer.

"Dinnertime Bambi." He says brandishing a bloody leg at Neil and grinning like an overgrown schoolboy. Neil stops himself from cringing and takes the leg. "Bambi and Bambi, how cute."

Leonie eventually lights a fire and roasts chunks of the deer speared onto sticks. Neil watches as Lani tears through chunks of meat, "What?" She asks mouth full.

"Remember how Elma made us eat all that food before we came in?" They both laugh, those were the good old days, eating chicken and fish and pasta until their jaws ached. It suddenly seems less funny though when he examines her face, the way her cheek bones jut out unnaturally and the skin stretches over them. They've been here for almost two weeks but it feels much shorter due to the memory loss. It also feels much longer when Neil tries to remember the training centre, the reaping, his life before. It all seems laughable, that he tried to hard to please his father, it was always coming down to this. Him and Lani and a dead deer and two people who could kill them without so much as a second thought.

"I'm going on sentry duty, who's coming?" Leonie asks brushing her hands off on her pants. She's not that tall, and if Neil didn't know who she was he'd say she was pleasant looking. Someone you wouldn't mind getting to know better.

"I'll go." He says reaching up to pull his hood over his head only to discover it's no longer attached to the back of his jacket. Something must have happened in the last period of forgetting. Neil pretends it doesn't bother him, feeling like his life is being lived by two different people. Pretends that feeling isn't familliar.

There's a rustle, the kind that could have been a person or maybe just the wind in the branches of the impossibly tall trees. Leonie squints, "I'm going to check it out. Stay here." He watches the retreat of her dark red hair, like a flag, like a riding hood into the tangle of branches. Neil swings his axe absent-mindedly, the weight of it oddly comforting, something from home to keep him safe. The sleeve on his jacket begins to ride up slightly, going to tug on it he suddenly stops. On his arm written in what can only be dried blood he's written '1 and 2 still allies'. He stares at it for a moment and doesn't know whether to laugh or cry because he's gotten himself into it and he can't even remember what _it_ is.

Suddenly from the underbrush he hears the unmistakable _swhing! _of a blade slicing through air and the following thunk as it hits something solid. That sounds was his lullaby, only when he was young the thunk came from the unyielding trunk of a tree, now it comes from the body of a tribute. The canon follows like thunder following lightning as Leonie crashes back through the trees. "That twat from 5." She says answering the question Neil knows must be written on his face. There's only the trirbutes from 1, 2, him and Lani left now. Final 6.

He didn't even notice this time. The fog that normally fell and then lifted with the forgetting confused for weariness. Neil's suddenly blinking in the sunlight alone in a clearing. He checks his arm. No message. He doesn't have a pack, no food, no supplies just his axe. The Gamemakers have probably split them up an avalanche or another fire. "Lani!" He calls as loudly as he dares. No reply. Of course. Sighing Neil turns and starts to head up hill, he hates being down by the Cornucopia where the land was so low and the snow so deep. Up higher he can see more and the snow is more densely packed and easier to walk on.

Suddenly so loudly and bloodcurdlingly that birds fly up in flocks from trees he hears it. "_Neil! Neil! NEIL!_" His feet go on autopilot running towards the sound, up, and up, and up, and up. He bursts through the trees following it, dodging branches and stumbling over roots until Lani's voice is _right there_.

Only she's not. He turns in a circle. No frightened, wounded, or dead Lani. Until it comes again "_Neil!_" but it's not beside him. It's coming from above. Neil glances up. A jabberjay, proud as can be sitting on a tree limb screaming with Lani's voice. A distraction. A ploy. Neil's running again before his mind catches up with his legs, because the Gamemakers never do anything by accident. They were leading him away from Lani. So he runs, down, down, down, half running half falling down the slope of the mountain. He reaches the Cornucopia only to hear the canon boom.

When Neil wasn't Neil, or rather before he was Neil he had lived in a house in the middle of the woods. The woods were dark and deep and scary. Not-Neil had a sister too who was brave and kind and true. They used to tell stories in the house in the woods. Stories to keep out the dark. Stories of girls who were brave and kind and true with boys who were strong and noble and good. The girl in red and the huntsman. Together they could defeat the Big Bad Wolf. Together they could do anything.

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

When Neil finally comes to, fighting through the fog all he can see is red. Red on the ground, red on his hands, red leaking out from the bodies of Leonie, Jotham, and the unnamed tributes from 1.

His screaming mixes with the trumpets.

The drug induced haze is too much like the feeling of forgetting in the arena. After the first hysterical screaming fit in which Neil almost bit off his tongue they leave him. He doesn't have any major damage other than one long dark scar that slices across his face. Mostly they seem concerned with pumping him full of nutritional suppliments and erasing the damage the arena has done. On the outside at least.

Kit comes first. "Hey kiddo. Nice job out there." His eyes tell a different story though, because he's always known hasn't he? Known who Lani was. Secrets don't discriminate. Rich, poor, labouror, manager, scout, it all gets around in 7. Elma is marginally more cheerful chattering about all the lovely parties he's been invited to already all the lovely sponsors who sent him his axe.

"Aren't you excited?" He tries to shrug before he remembers he's been tied down. A Victor yet still trapped. He doesn't even imagine it could get worse. It does of course, it always does.

Charlie comes three days in. He's been crying, his eyes bloodshot and sore looking. Neil remembers the boy they took the pack from. For the first time he feels guilt and it's for someone he didn't even kill. Charlie doesn't ask any stupid questions though, doesn't tell him it'll get better, doesn't tell him he's lucky to be alive. He just tells him the truth. "Before I went in. Steven...Steven told me that I needed to have something to come back for. I had him. You need to find what you've stayed alive for, the thing you didn't even know you were surviving for. You'll know it when you see it. Trust me."

When he leaves Neil cries for the first time. Long weeping shuttering sobs. His only comfort that he's saved Lani from this fate.

By the end of the week he's both desperate and dreading to see his Games during the interview. He wants to, needs to know what happened. How everything unfolded start to finish. How if he can see Lani in the ways he's forgotten it's more time he'll have had with her. That she won't be dead, not really until he sees it, truly sees it. That he won't have killed anyone until he sees it.

That's when it begins really. With Caesar Flickerman ending the recap with a dramatic shot of him from above, the bodies around him creating a flower, a sun, a star with him at the centre. He's a star. Neil Perry from District 7.

Then the parties come. For almost 3 months they keep him in the Capitol and very quickly Neil becomes an actor. He learns not to let it show on his face when the beautiful shiny people of the Capitol disgust him either with their grotesce body modifications or their love of the Games. He learns to dance and how to flatter a lady. He learns how to fake a smile and how to hold it long after his jaw hurts. He practically weeps with relief when Elma says the Capitol is satisfied for now. He can go home.

The moment he's off the train he heads deep into the woods. Going home and not going home all at the same time. His mother but not his mother opens the door in one jumbled tangled of paradoxes. "Can I come in?" Neil asks voice softer and rougher than it had been in the Capitol, "Please?" She hesitates, the door half open, half closed.

"Yes. Alright." She says finally relenting, the door opening. Now that it's real, that the moment he envisioned for months is happening he panics.

"I should," He starts, "I should just go. Sorry I shouldn't have-I mean just wanted to-I need to." He turns, heart hammering so hard it hurts. She calls out to him, his other name, his _real_ name but he just keeps running. Because he's not that boy anymore and it's no longer than simple.

While he was in the Capitol his parents moved into the house in the Victor's Village. It's too big, too clean, too new, too much for three people who spend most of their time avoiding each other. His mother especially seems frightened of him. When the nightmares start no one comes in to soothe him he just screams and screams and screams. His father just gives him hollow glances on the rare occasions he is in the home. He knows Neil knows and that he wanted to die in the arena. Neil's betrayed him, his perfect son. They love him though, they love him so hard it hurt all of them, knocks the wind out of them and leaves them bleeding because they don't know what to do with all their shattered edges. He loves them but can't forgive them and they feel the same way. It's a relief really when Neil goes on his Victory Tour.

It starts in 12 and he spends most of his time at Charlie and Steven's house. Charlie comes gallavanting out the front door and envelopes him in a lopsided hug. "Well if it isn't the wonderboy from District 7!" Their house is the only one occupied and the whole Village gives off an air of death despite Charlie's obvious attempts to be welcoming. Inside it's filled with things, blueprints and models, diagrams and what Neil can only assume are half finished inventions. They flock the house like a strange pack of small animals. Charlie deftly navigates his way over them, "Steven! Neil's here!" He shouts up the stairs before sitting himself down feet proped up on the kitchen table.

"How you holding out?" He asks suddenly serious.

"Surviving."

"You remember what I told you, okay?" Charlie's the same age as him, maybe younger but at times like these he seems so _old_, Neil wonders belatedly if that's how people see him now. An old soul. They sit in silence until footsteps on the stairs breaks them out of their stupor.

"Hello Neil." Steven says always polite, "Sorry about the mess."

"We're designing a new mine shaft." Charlie says proudly.

Neil doesn't even know what a mine shaft is. "Oh." He says stupidly looking over a blueprint and pretending he can see any sort of design.

"Did you buy bread?" Steven asks. "It was on the list."

"What list?" Charlie pauses, when Steven gives him a withering look and holds up a slip of paper " Okay, I'm off to go buy bread. You two crazy kids don't have too much fun while I'm gone." He gives Steven a peck on the cheek and then he's gone.

"Neil, what do you know about District 3?" He asks sitting down in Charlie's chair. "Probably not a lot I'm guessing." Neil shrugs, he knows they're factories, electronics, technology things for the Capitol mostly. "In 3 there's an academy. It's sort of like the academies they have in 1, 2, and 4, or so I've heard only they're not for training for the Games, they're for gifted children. When I was 10 I started at an academy. They said I was a prodigy, wanted to put me in an advanced program. Only the thing is if you're in the advanced program the District becomes your legal guardian. My parents signed me off into the care of the District and I haven't seen them since. For a long time, a long time I resented them, hated them for what they did to me. But Neil, they were doing what they thought was right. Though they were giving me a better life. Maybe they did. If I wasn't in the academy I probably would have died in the arena. I wouldn't have this," He gestures around vaguely but the true meaning of _this_ is clear in the tenderness of his voice. "Just, I know it's hard to forgive them. But maybe you should try and understand them first."

Steven's words echo in his mind for the rest of the Victory Tour, up through the districts he goes. Some are better, some are worse. For one horrible moment in 8 he swears he sees Lani in the crowd, he doesn't know whether he should be relieved or disapointed when a second glances proves it to be someone else. At least a hallucination would keep him company. Kit's normally witty banter seems smarmy and Elma overbearing after weeks together on the train. In District 4 he breaks off by himself.

District 4 is both exactly what he'd imagined and not at all what he'd thought. The white sand beaches, the beautiful people, the endless blue-green water seem like they come out of a Capitol television program. But the people, the almost melodic sounds of their voices and the overwhelming penetrating smell of salt surprise him. He wanders around keeping to back alleys in the small coastal town and avoiding large groups of people. His skin feels too tight and hot but he relishes the feeling. It's nothing like 7 and it's defintely nothing like the arena.

He ends up completely and utterly lost along the shoreline, pants rolled up shoes in hand. Neil wanders along the seashore until day begins to turn into night and he know that Elma and Kit will be out searching for him, he's supposed to be giving a speech to the good people of District 4. They won't mind not having to pretend that they care about him. He's doing a public service. Neil's pondering all this when he almost walks into a boy sitting crosslegged at the very end of the shore, just far enough away that the water doesn't reach him when it laps up onto the land.

"Sorry," Neil says "Don't let me bother you." The boy looks up and Neil's breath catches in his throat. It's Todd Anderson, the Victor from 3 years ago, an absolute _beast_ in the arena with his crossbow. He stares up at him. "Sorry, I'll just-I'm going. Sorry I didn't mean to bother you." He turns to head the opposite direction suddenly feeling absolutely stupid for wandering alone in a district he doesn't know. Kit and Elma don't even know where he is. Frantically he steps out of the surf pulling his pant legs down and stuffing his feet into their shoes.

"It was the snow." The voices catches him like burrs on a coat. Slightly froggy sounding, or maybe that's just how people talk here, all the salt making it's way into their vocal cords. Neil turns and looks at Todd. He doesn't look like he remembers, all death and danger. His fringe falls into his eyes and he looks almost scared.

"I'm sorry?"

He reaches up and flicks the hair out of his eyes, "They put the compound, the one that made you forget, in the snow. Only the tributes who ate the snow had any memory loss." The voice is flat, like he's memorized it and is now repeating it, but his eyes say something completely different.

Neil feels all the air rush out of his body. "How did you know that?" He asks shakely, his tongue feeling too large for his mouth.

Todd looks back out at the sea. Like this isn't important. Like he hasn't just handed Neil the missing piece which explains everything, every single thing that happened during his Games. "I watched you a lot. Sorry about your sister by the way." he pauses, "You had the same eyes." He replies answering the question Neil never asked.

"Oh."

"I guess you'd better be going."

"I don't have to." Neil watches as the words leave his mouth, it can practically see them floating in the space between them and he has the urge to shove them all back into his mouth.

Todd looks up at him, his eyes blue-green-grey, like the sea, like the sky, and smiles slightly. "Okay."

Neil smiles, a full proper smile that'd time in the Capitol had almost made him forget. He sits down in the sand and watches the sea with a boy who he's only just met but he feels more complete than he has in years. They watch as dark clouds billow and group on the horizon, a storm yet to come, but here everything's calm.

It's the beginning of the end.

**A.N. So...yeah, apparently this is a three-part mini-series now. I just feel like the whole story of what happens with Neil, Todd, and Ginny was too beautifully tragic to leave alone. **

**-C**


End file.
